Top 68 Quotes & Sayings by Oliver North

What's been happening in Iraq, what young Americans wearing flak jackets, helmets and flight suits have done is... created the circumstances under which Iraq can become our closest ally in that part of the world and still have a representative government. And that's going to be a very good thing considering what's going on in that neighborhood.

The American people need to tell their member of Congress that we need a strong defense to protect us and to prevent wars. We can't get away with simply leading from behind and gutting our defenses.

My mom told me a long time ago, 'Never get in a fight with a lady.'

I'm a military guy. I'm not a political character.

I can remember as a young lieutenant being sent into the DMZ in the divided Vietnam, from North Vietnam.

In World War II, the book you have in front of you, it was said and it is probably true, that there was not a single American who did not know the name of somebody serving in uniform.

There's the assumption being made by the national security advisers to the Obama administration that the North Korean leadership is not suicidal, that they know they will be obliterated if they attacked the United States. But I would point that everything in South Korea and Japan is well within range of what they might want to do.

All of my high school male teachers were WWII and/or Korean War veterans. They taught my brothers and me the value of service to our country and reinforced what our dad had shown us about the meaning of service.

Writers are storytellers. So are readers.

I am here to accept responsibility for that which I did. I will not accept responsibility for that which I did not do.

I was provided with additional input that was radically different from the truth. I assisted in furthering that version.

My wife said to me... you never understood what we were going through back home, did you? And I didn't. And I have to confess that.

We've been in the nation-building business since World War I, and especially since WWII. The goal is not a Jeffersonian Democracy in Afghanistan, but a representative government that respects human rights, protects its own people, and is a friend of the West. These are very realistic - and necessary - goals.

Without any intended hubris, I've lead a pretty exciting life. What I've tried to do in Mission Compromised is draw on those experiences to create a sense of excitement and realism within the story.

The National Security Council's real role is to coordinate the various activities of the government of the United States in the furtherance of American foreign policy.

I like to tell people that I have the best job in the media. All I do is hang around with heroes. I do that every week for my 'War Stories' documentary series - and when FOX News wants - I go off and cover the young Americans we send to places like Afghanistan or Iraq.

I don't think there is another person in America that wants to tell this story as much as I do.

In my first book, Under Fire, I wrote that I revered Ronald Reagan. That was a dozen years ago. I still feel that way. I think he changed the world for the better for my children and my children's children.

If you could have imagined that someone is happy that Obama is president, it has to be Jimmy Carter because he is no longer the worst president in our history.

The terrorists that we are up against today do not rely upon cell phones and SAT phones and emails. They rely on couriers. You cannot intercept what a courier is telling somebody.

We've got a very difficult situation created by this embrace of the so-called Arab Spring. And that's not getting better. It's getting worse. The carnage for the people of Syria is horrific, and it's quite frankly too little, too late to reverse a lot of that.

In North Korea, grass is a vegetable eaten by the people, and they've got nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles. So, something more stringent than what's been done to North Korea is going to have to work; otherwise, a military strike is the only option.

When you're told to go brief a United States senator on a covert operation, you go do it. And you trust the information isn't going to leak.

The United Nations passed so-called sanctions again on North Korea, and they've said they 'will exercise their preemptive right to a nuclear attack.' I don't think this ought to be taken kindly.

I came here to tell you the truth, the good, the bad and the ugly.

I haven't, in the 23 years that I have been in the uniformed services of the United States of America, ever violated an order - not one.

And so, the youngsters you have today, even though there are far fewer of them - in World War II 16.5 million men and women in uniform, today roughly a million in uniform in spite of the fact that the country is almost twice as large a population as we had in World War II.

In uniform, I had to make judgments about the best course of action in combat when the only choices were 'bad' or 'worse.' As a member of the media, I only had to decide how to get the best 'shot' - preferably without getting shot.

I'm trusting in the Lord and a good lawyer.

I never considered myself a fall guy. I know what I did. I know why I did it. I'm not ashamed of it.

A Commander-in-Chief needs to do two things. One - tell us who the enemy is. And two - say we are fighting to win.

I'm still in touch with a lot people who continue to serve our country well.

Bill Clinton is not my commander-in-chief.

I thought using the Ayatollah's money to support the Nicaraguan resistance was a neat idea.

As a Marine officer in combat, I was responsible for the lives and safety of all the Marines who served with me.

Nothing is going to change the fact that I believe Ronald Reagan is the greatest president in my lifetime - may well be the greatest president this nation ever had.

The Obama administration has turned a blind eye to radical Islam since before they came to office. If you look at everything that's transpired since the famous Cairo speech in 2009, it's all been an embrace of those who are the most radical elements in that part of the world. That is not a good sign for America's foreign policy.

I would not trade you a billion dollars for the kids I led to combat in Vietnam or in fact any of the Marines that I served with for a quarter of a century.

And of course there is so much of World War II that is documented that we never have seen.

I think as a rifle platoon and company commander your view is about 1,000 meters in front of you and you hope you can cover that ground and not have to back up and give it up again.

Today, only 2 percent of the people know the name of someone serving in uniform. That means 2 percent of your listeners can actually conjure up the image of someone wearing the uniform of the military of the United States.

One of the great upsides to a national book tour is the chance to break out of television's cocoon and interact directly with the American people.

God knows, we don't want prayer.

I was authorized to do everything that I did.

I want to make it clear that I honestly answered every question put to me during the so-called Iran-Contra hearings. But if they didn't ask me about something, I wasn't about to reveal things that would put other people in jeopardy.

The lesson of Pearl Harbor ought never to be forgotten, and of course the motto that came from that, 69 years ago, the war which my dad fought, was 'Remember Pearl Harbor, never again.' We need to keep that to mind.

Vladimir Putin is leading a dying country. Vladimir Putin's regime exports three things: petroleum products - coal, natural gas, and hydrocarbon energy in the form of petroleum. Number two, it exports arms, and, number three, it exports people.

It's one thing to say don't commit atrocities on the battlefield. It's another thing to say don't get caught doing atrocities.

The 2.4 million bright, brave, incredibly fit and remarkably talented young Americans who have served in our armed forces since we were attacked on 9-11-01 are all volunteers. As General Petraeus put it during a conversation we had in Afghanistan, 'They all came or stayed, knowing they were going to war.' For more than a decade, these patriots and their loved ones have made extraordinary sacrifices for this country. They embody the classical definition of heroes: those who put themselves at risk for the benefit of others.

The average term length of a member of congress is approaching 15 years, and the average term length of a convicted criminal is less than three. We've got that backward.

Heroes aren't athletes who set new sports records, or Hollywood actors who make 'daring' films or politicians who make bold promises. Heroes are people who place themselves at risk for the benefit of others.

I want to make it clear that I honestly answered every question put to me during the so-called Iran-Contra hearings. But if they didn't ask me about something, I wasn't about to reveal things that would put other people in jeopardy

We don't need a head of state who guts our defenses and draws phony red lines with a pink crayon.

We lie by not telling you things...We don't lie by telling you things that aren't true.

Death is never easy when you know the people doing the dying.

The terrorists that we are up against today do not rely upon cell phones and SAT phones and emails. They rely on couriers. You cannot intercept what a courier is telling somebody

I would have promised those terrorists a trip to Disneyland if it would have gotten the hostages released. I thank God they were satisfied with the missiles and we didn't have to go to that extreme.

An easy life is rarely meaningful and a meaningful life rarely easy.

History and war are cruel pedants. Those who know too little of the former are likely to have too much of the latter.

President Reagan didn't always know what he knew.